1. Ancient Rome 753-509 7 Kings 509 – c. 44 BCE Republic Civil wars
31 BCE – c. 476 CE/AD? Roman Empire
Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire

2. Rome and the Provinces

3. Emperor’s word becomes law
Emperor’s word becomes law. Various ways emperor (princeps) makes his will known as law:
rescripts (written replies), responsa: most common
Replies, either by letter or just subscriptions (notes added at the bottom)
mandates (instructions to officials)
edicts (advised by his consilium and jurists)
decreta (decisions): emperor’s judicial decisions
INCREASE IN: legal experts, often on emperor’s staff
Praetor’s edicts still exist.

4. Rome: Great fire of 64
“Nero fiddled while …”? Source: “enraptured by what he called ‘the beauty of the flames,’ Nero put on his tragedian’s costume and sang The Sack of Ilium [Troy].” Suet. 38
“watched from the Tower of Maecenas”

5. Nero, 54-68: the first persecution of Christians
Julio-Claudians = 1st 5 emperors (Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, Nero)
Nero, 54-68: the first persecution of Christians
Fire in Rome, 64
Nero executed Christians (Tacitus explains why)
“their hatred of humanity”
Presumably he conducted “show trials” before his council (consilium)

6. Lex de imperio Vespasiani
Vespasian: emperor, 69-79
Lex de imperio Vespasiani
appointed by Nero to handle Jewish rebellion (66-)
Proclaimed in East on July 1
Senate confirmed him
Codified officially the position of emperor by law (as opposed to Augustus’s auctoritas )
He gets what Augustus had

7. Law granting Imperium to Vespasian
“it shall be lawful for him to make a treaty with whom he wishes, just as it was lawful for the deified Augustus, for Tiberius Julius Caesar Augustus, and for Tiberius Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus;”
“And that it shall be lawful for him to hold a session of the Senate, to make a motion in it, to refer a matter to it, to propose decrees of the Senate … just as it was lawful for the deified Augustus, for Tiberius Julius Caesar Augustus, for Tiberius Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus; …”
“And that whatsoever persons seeking a magistracy, power, imperium, or charge of anything he commends to the Roman Senate and people and to whomsoever he gives or promises his electoral support special consideration of them shall be taken in every election …”

8. Oh yeah, one more …
“And that whatever he considers to be in accordance with the public advantage and the dignity of divine and human and public and private interests he shall have the right and the power to do and to execute, just as had the deified Augustus and Tiberius Julius Caesar Augustus and Tiberius Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus; …”
Tacitus laments: “How few were left who had known the Republic”!

9. Colosseum (Flavian Amphitheater)
Begun by Vespasian, dedicated by Titus in 80, completed by Domitian

10. “the 5 good emperors” 96-180 CE
Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, Antoninus Pius, Marcus Aurelius
“If a man were called to fix the period in the history of the world during which the condition of the human race was most happy and prosperous, he would, without hesitation, name that which elapsed from the death of Domitian to the accession of Commodus.”
Edward Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1776-)

11. Trajan (98-117) M. Ulpius Traianus From a Roman colony in S. Spain
Later emperors prayed to be as good as Trajan
Chosen on merit but adopted for dynastic legitimacy: have it both ways

12. Trajan’s Forum with Trajan’s Column

13. TRAJAN’S NEW PROVINCES: DACIA, MESOPOTAMIA
Dacia abandoned by Aurelian in 270

14. Emperor: The agent of god’s providence on earth
One world, one emperor, one law.
(This contributed to monotheism, over time ….)
Panegyrics (by Pliny & others) downplay this and promote the ideology of a fair emperor:
“The emperor is not above the law, the law is above the emperor.”

15. Pliny the Younger
His uncle, Pliny the Elder, died in the eruption that buried Pompeii (Aug., 79)
a Roman Senator,; a friend of the historian Tacitus (who is also a Senator)
had been on Trajan’s consilium (council of legal advisors) 3 times

16. trials of Christians, 112 CE in Asia, and first account in history of Christian practices
Trajan sends Pliny as imperial legate to Bithynia, CE
Pliny’s letter to Trajan:
his cognitiones (plural of cognitio)
Why did he execute Christians?
They got off if they made offerings to statue of emperor & derided Christ
Trajan’s response: “… in keeping with the spirit of our age”

17. Cognitio procedure by a magistrate
Complain to official who issues a summons: state-issued (not privately)
If defendant does not reply to 3 summonses he loses the case
The magistrate hears the case
Written documents are now more important than oral testimony
The magistrate rules at his discretion
Court officials enforce the penalty (before it was done privately)
Appeal possible all the way up to the Emperor, but you need to be of high status and have connections, of course ….

18. Hadrian, 117-138 Adopted by Trajan (a relative) and acclaimed by army
Also a Roman from S. Spain
Travelled and firmed up frontiers

19. Aureus (gold coin) of Hadrian

20. Hadrian’s wall (northern Britain)

21. Hadrian’s Gate in Athens

22. Antinoos

23. Classical period of Roman Law, c. 32 BCE – 235 CE (High Roman Empire)
Under Hadrian, the praetor’s edict was codified and did not change.
Jurists: rise of legal experts, often on staff of Emperor and Governors
Jurists wrote books and advised judges
2 schools of jurists: strict and pragmatic
Ulpian, jurist, c. 200 CE: the emperor’s word is law
after the Classical period, changes appear in 3rd Century: emperor more autocratic.

24. Apuleius Author of the Latin novel, Metamorphoses or the Golden Ass
Published his Apology (defense speech).
On trial in North Africa for magic, CE; a capital charge
judge is the governor (proconsul) Claudius Maximus, a Stoic philosopher
he had married a rich widow, Pudentilla; her son died
she accused him in a letter of using love-charms
he had knowledge of magic; a statue of Mercury; a boy collapsed
15 slaves testified